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Citizen
The question is whether YOU would allow me to seceed. I know the US wont.Originally Posted by Occam's Razor
President
Sure you can. Go to another country, get citizenship there, and then enter the US Embassy and renounce your US citizenship - you've seceded. Is it reasonable to expect the USA to give up its territory to support your secession? I'd say no - since you are not a sovereign nation in perpetuity.
Citizen
The USA doesnt own my land.
President
Oh, but it does. It has the right to condemn and take your land. It's even embodied in the 5th Amendment - you can be deprived of your property after due process. It's called "eminent domain."
Secretary of Defense
That's correct. But it does make the laws that govern the territory on which your land is situated. What's more, there's no law against land in the United States being owned by foreigners, so if you emigrate, you can still own that land.
What you can't do is unilaterally take your land out of the nation so that its laws don't apply. Like it or not, we're a social species, and that means we build communities, and those communities are not voluntary except to the extent that you may take yourself elsewhere. (Some of them not even to that extent, but this one is.)
Actually, there is a way for you to have the kind of liberty you seem to want. Go into the wilderness and live by yourself. Build yourself a shack. Hunt, fish, and forage for food, or plant a garden. Support yourself entirely by your own labor, without taking anything from society. Technically that land probably belongs to someone or something, but if you choose it carefully you'll never be discovered and can live completely free of society's interference.
As long as you are choosing to live within a society, however, you are bound by its rules. To the extent it's a democracy you do get a say in what those rules are, but you certainly cannot simply decide that, while you are happy to take the benefits of living in this culture built by cooperative effort, you will regard yourself as a nation of one when it comes to obeying the law. That's trying to eat your cake and have it, too.
If Adam Smith were alive today, he'd be a socialist.
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." Mohandas K. Gandhi
Robin, a science-fiction dystopic version of the Robin Hood myth: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/44436
Secretary of State
Actually legality has zero to do with it. If the government wants it, it takes it. It has a bloody history of doing exactly that.
A is A
President
Well, in the US it has been tempered by the rule of law.
Secretary of State
Sure, make it legal to kill people and take their land. Then kill them and take it.
Of course most of the time they didn't bother to make it legal first.
A is A
Vice President
Which is pretty much the history of mankind. I am not surprised that our ancestors did the same thing that went on for thousands of years. It was the natural and accepted thing to do.
Did not eminent domain once require that the land forcibly bought from you HAD to be used for a purpose that publically benefitted our society? Like a library, post office, highways, etc? I know some States have dropped the bar on this and can force you to sell IF a business wants it, or so I think I heard. Enlighten me if I have it wrong.
Secretary of Defense
Correction: humans have a bloody history of doing exactly that.
Government is one of the tools that makes it easier to do what you're talking about, but it's hardly the only method.
Citizen
Guess we'll have to disagree. BUt then, your side has all the guns.
Secretary of State
No, eminent domain does require some benefit as you state.
Most of the land taken where they simply killed the people who lived there had nothing to do with eminent domain.
A is A
Joint Chiefs of Staff Member
Shortsighted?!?!? Are you fing serious? Being shortsighted has nothing to do with it. What your suggesting is nothing short that bribery.
Give me birth-control and abortions now and there wont be any trouble later.
I for one recognize when I'm being forced to pay protection money and I don't like it.
"Chaplain Charlie will tell you about how the free world will conquer Communism with the aid of God and a few marines! God has a hard-on for marines because we kill everything we see! He plays His games, we play ours! To show our appreciation for so much power, we keep heaven packed with fresh souls! God was here before the Marine Corps! So you can give your heart to Jesus, but your ass belongs to the Corps! Do you ladies understand?"
Secretary of Defense
How is paying for more prisons any different from protection money?
One way, you're paying to keep the poor from revolting.
The other way, you're paying to keep them in prison if they get desperate enough to commit a crime.
Either way, you're paying for "protection."
Joint Chiefs of Staff Member
Well while the convics are in jail they are unable to reproduse and in a sence is PP.
I will reiterate my point. It is not my nor the government's job to provide birth control and abortions. It is not my nor the government's job to protect people from themselves.
If you want to donate your money to PP then do so directly and without putting your hand in my pocket. I will donate my own cash to a charity of my choosing AND I promise you that I will not put my hand in your pocket to do it.
"Chaplain Charlie will tell you about how the free world will conquer Communism with the aid of God and a few marines! God has a hard-on for marines because we kill everything we see! He plays His games, we play ours! To show our appreciation for so much power, we keep heaven packed with fresh souls! God was here before the Marine Corps! So you can give your heart to Jesus, but your ass belongs to the Corps! Do you ladies understand?"
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